Conventionally, a collision protection structure is known wherein a shock absorbing member (knee absorber, knee protector or the like) is provided at a position opposed to the knees of an occupant of a vehicle on the front side of a driver's seat or a front passenger seat of the vehicle so that a knee load by secondary collision of the occupant is absorbed or reduced upon head-on collision of the vehicle thereby to protect the knees of the occupant. It is desirable to provide such a shock absorbing member for protecting the knees of the occupant at a position at which the shock absorbing member contacts with the knees of the occupant upon head-on collision of the vehicle. However, in a common vehicle, since an instrumental panel is provided on the front side of the occupant, the collision protection member may not necessarily be capable of being provided at the desired position. Particularly, since a glove box is disposed at a lower portion of the instrumental panel opposed to the front passenger seat, the constraint to the disposition position of the collision protection member is strong.
On the other hand, for example, Patent Document 1 (Japanese Patent Application Laid-Open Publication NO. 2004-203237) discloses an occupant protection apparatus wherein two supporting members extending in a forward and backward direction on the outer sides than the positions of the knees of an occupant of a vehicle in the vehicle widthwise direction are provided on the back face side of a panel on the compartment inner side of the glove box. With such a structure as just described, if a knee of the occupant collides with the panel upon head-on collision of the vehicle and the knee load is applied to the panel, then a central portion of the panel is deformed into a curved shape such that it projects forward of the vehicle. At this time, since the panel is deformed into a curved shape around fulcrums provided by the supporting members, the knee load acting upon the panel can be absorbed irrespective of the physique of the occupant to protect the knee of the occupant. Further, an insert panel for collision absorption is provided on the panel, and the knee load can be absorbed also by deformation of the insert panel for collision absorption.
However, in the technology disclosed in Patent Document 1 described above, since the knee load is absorbed by deformation of the panel (including the insert panel) of the glove box, there is the possibility that the displacement amount of the knee of the occupant in the forward and backward direction may increase.